… “THE COOLER may sound as if it’s a dark sitcom, with broad characters and an easy payoff. But the movie, directed by first-timer Wayne Kramer and written by him with Frank Hannah, has a strange way of being broad and twisted at the same time, so that while we surf the surface of […]

“Unlike the majority of American battle movies in recent years — movies that often treat real wars as huge video games fought by wise-cracking superheroes and bloodthirsty supervillains — Bodrov’s update of Tolstoy’s tale suggests that wars are simply fought, with sometimes hideous consequences, by men. (And, in this case, women and children.)” (Chicago Tribune)